From: Brian D Williams (talon57@well.com)
Date: Fri Jul 20 2001 - 14:30:05 MDT
>From: "Reason" <reason@exratio.com>
>>Brian D Williams
>> I think it's a serious social problem that many citizens quite
>> literally have nothing "invested" in this country.
>I'd agree with this; it's back to basic human psychology again.
>People don't care about something unless they built it or
>something that they own or value is at stake. S'why council flats
>and communal property are such a horrible failure in terms of
>maintenance and responsibility.
Big city housing projects are a prime example of this.
>Not a new idea; Heinlein advocated creating this citizen
>investment through military and government service. I think I like
>the money idea more; it scales better to larger populations.
"Starship Troopers" was probably the biggest reason I joined the
Marine Corp, and I've been saying TANSTAAFL ever since I read "The
Moon is a Harsh Mistress". Guess you could say I come from a good
background. ;)
The money thing seems like a good fit for America, we could all pay
something toward basic things like education and such, but parents
would pay more depending on how many children they have. That way
you're not telling people what to do, but they do have to literally
pay for their own decisions. Seems like a more equitable solution
to me, but I'm open to suggestions/ideas.
There might be a way to rig the health insurance thing here.
>Anyone read that Spinrad novel about the Blue and Pink War? It has
>a very interesting democratic model, as well as some thoughts on
>how democracies get destablized by the media and mass stupidity.
>Specifically of interest was the concept of a government actively
>breaking up monopolies by providing seed money to 'govcorps' to
>compete in given spaces -- i.e. basically acting as a VC.
Gonna have to look it up, check out that "tragedy of the commons"
paper I mentioned.... (www.dieoff.org/page95.htm)
Brian
Member:
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